Ad description
A TV ad for a car insurance comparison website, on 11 April 2011, featured a cartoon of a woman walking through a town while a voice-over made various claims about insurance premiums and the advertised service. Superimposed text at the bottom of the screen stated "Premium increase 37% (Towers Watsons data Oct 09 - Sept 10), 96% could achieve a saving, 45% could save up to £218.73 (Consumer Intelligence research Jan 11), 96.5% of 3206 respondents (Confused.com survey Nov 10)."
Issue
Three complainants, who believed the font, colour, background and size of the superimposed text made it illegible, challenged whether it was presented clearly.
Response
Inspop.com (Inspop) said the superimposed text (the super) in the ad was added in accordance with Clearcast guidelines. They argued that they had added an outline around the 16 line high letters to give the text improved legibility against the moving background and pointed out that it was also held on screen for the first 28 seconds of the 30-second ad. They said that decision had been taken to accommodate the moving background, giving ample time for the audience to read the super.
Clearcast said the super in the ad went through their usual tests for length of hold, size and legibility which were conducted by their traffic manager on broadcast quality master files. They said they had asked for the addition of the white outline around the letters and, once that had been added, their traffic manager was satisfied that the text was legible and suitable for broadcast. They said that decision was not questioned by the copy team because the tests applied to supers were both stringent and consistent.
Assessment
Upheld
The ASA noted that the BCAP Code required qualifying text to be presented clearly and that the complainants had challenged whether the font, colour, background and size of the super made it unclear. We noted that BCAP published specific guidance in addition to the Code on the criteria supers should meet with regard to those factors.
We noted that, in line with that guidance, the text of the super in the ad was 16 lines high and the typeface was not ornate, serifed or italicised and, with regard to size and font, we did not consider it to be unclear.
We noted, however, that the text was superimposed directly onto the images of the ad itself which showed a cartoon of a woman walking through an animated town. We noted that the scenes themselves regularly zoomed, cut, scrolled and changed colour directly behind the text and that, in one of the scenes in which it appeared, the text was in front of a vibrating, cartoon, computer keyboard.
We understood that Inspop and Clearcast had added a white outline to the blue text to improve its legibility against the moving background. However, we considered that the cumulative effect of the blue text, the edging and the animated background made the appearance of the text blurred and unclear for much of the ad and we also understood that such edging techniques were cautioned against in the guidance precisely for that reason. We concluded that the superimposed text had not been presented clearly.
The ad breached BCAP Code rule
3.11
3.11
Qualifications must be presented clearly.
BCAP has published Guidance on Superimposed Text to help television broadcasters ensure compliance with rule 3.11. The guidance is available at:
http://www.cap.org.uk/~/media/Files/CAP/Help%20notes%20new/BCAP_Advertising_Guidance_Notes_1.ashx
(Qualification).
Action
The ad must not appear again in its current form.
